Ezra Schwartz, 18, was among five people who were killed in two separate attacks in the West Bank and Tel Aviv that authorities say were carried out by Palestinians.
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Jewish Agency spokesperson Avi Mayer confirmed on Twitter that the American, Ezra Schwartz, was a participant in Masa, a program that provides funding for study overseas and gap year programs in Israel. Tovya Goodwin, 17, also from Sharon, has known Schwartz for more than ten years. The military said soldiers shot at the attacker, although his condition and identity were unknown.
In Thursday’s first attack, a knife-wielding man stabbed and killed two Israelis as several of them gathered for afternoon prayers at an office building in the Israeli commercial center of Tel Aviv.
The attacks are part of wave of violence that began in September over tensions surrounding a Jerusalem holy site sacred to Jews and Muslims.
Last night, a man who declined to speak with reporters, walked out of Maimonides and slowly lowered the US and Israeli flags to half-staff.
Ezra Schwartz was an 18-year-old who was spending his gap year in Israel when he was killed. Students at Maimonides were informed of Schwartz’s killing at a school assembly on Thursday.
“He was a counselor for the younger kids, kids loved him”, Sussman told WBUR.
The U.S. Department of State said it extended its condolences to his family and friends.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the attacks in a Facebook post.
Two people were killed in a stabbing in Tel Aviv Thursday. You will be thought of and missed immensely every day in the hearts of your Ashreinu family and in the hearts of Israel.
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The suspect was identified by Palestinian media as a West Bank man named Mohammed Abdel Basset al-Kharoub. At least one attacker opened fire from a vehicle then crashed into a group of pedestrians near a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, police and the army said.
